Portuguese (Portugal) · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "igreja" in Portuguese (Portugal)?

Q: How do you pronounce igreja in Portuguese (Portugal)?

igreja is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written [iˈɡɾe.ʒɐ]. It means “church.” Say 'ee-GREH-zhuh', stressing the middle syllable, with j again giving a soft 'zh' sound.

Say 'ee-GREH-zhuh', stressing the middle syllable, with j again giving a soft 'zh' sound.

igreja [iˈɡɾe.ʒɐ]

Stress falls on the second syllable gre; the initial i is a clear, quick 'ee', and j is pronounced as the soft 'zh' of 'measure', with the final a reducing to 'uh'.

Listen: igreja

Free browser voice. Hear it read by a real native speaker inside the LingoDrop app.

Sound it out

i Unstressed but still a clear, short 'ee' sound, as in English 'machine'.

gre The stressed syllable, a hard 'g' as in 'go' plus a tapped r and an open 'eh'.

ja J is the soft 'zh' of English 'measure'; the final a is unstressed and fades to 'uh'.

Hear it in a sentence

A igreja fica no centro da cidade.

The church is in the city center.

Listen: A igreja fica no centro da cidade.

Free browser voice. Hear it read by a real native speaker inside the LingoDrop app.

A igreja fica no centro da cidade again uses ficar for a fixed location, paired with no (em + o) and da (de + a), stacking two preposition-article contractions in a single short sentence — a very normal density of contractions in everyday Portuguese that can look intimidating to a beginner reading it for the first time.

Where English speakers slip

Because the g in igreja is followed by r rather than e or i, it stays a hard 'g' as in 'go' — learners sometimes second-guess this and soften it, expecting the g-before-e/i softening rule from Spanish or Portuguese words like gente. The real trap word-wide, though, is still j: keep it a soft 'zh', not a hard English 'j'.